A Human Touch
by Kansas J. Miller
Summary: Donna thinks about CJ. [Slash]


TITLE: A Human Touch  
  
AUTHOR: Kansas J. Miller  
  
PAIRING: CJ/Donna  
  
RATING: PG  
  
SUMMARY: Donna muses.  
  
SPOILERS: Not really any.  
  
~*~  
  
Hers is a human touch. That's how I see it. My mind and my body don't care that she's another woman. It feels right, it seems natural. I never think that I should be somewhere else. Her love is warm, real, alive. And that's all we need, really, just another human's touch.  
  
I'm sure Josh and the other senior staffers would not agree. Of course, I wouldn't expect them to understand, because there was a time when I wouldn't have understood, either. A year ago, I never could have predicted that it would be her I'd crave.  
  
Of course, I'd always admired CJ. Unconventionally beautiful, tall and graceful, strong, her own woman. I thought of myself in comparison to her, always wondering if I'd ever grow up to be that great, that in control of my life.  
  
But I'd put CJ on such a pedestal that the woman I got to know was no one near the woman I'd imagined. Because right from the start of the campaign, she was one of my bosses, someone I watched from afar but did not spend real time with. I was jealous of Carol because I wanted to be CJ's friend, never aware that the feelings I had went much deeper.  
  
I'm not sure when we started to get together outside of professional circumstances. Lunch in the Mess, a trip to the yogurt place, a latte at Starbucks.we were friends, and she was right down the hallway. CJ was fun and light, easy to be around and easy to like. There eventually came a time when the pedestal fell away and I saw CJ on the same level as I saw myself.  
  
She wasn't totally in control, I discovered. She was a regular woman in need of the same real-world things that I wanted. There was a side to CJ that was not all wit and humor and sarcasm; there was a CJ who just wanted to be.  
  
We were slightly drunk the first time that we kissed, stumbling over our feet and our words, but it was a kiss nonetheless. She pushed me up against the closed door of her apartment and if I close my eyes, I can still remember the smell of bar smoke that lightly lingered in her hair. I was so utterly and completely torn by it all, my mind reeling itself into tiny knots as I tried to put a meaning into the way her lips felt against mine.  
  
After she'd moved away, we acted like nothing had happened. Draining a bottle of wine between us, we simply balled up on opposite ends of the sofa, flicking through the channels while the room blanketed us in blue television darkness. Her feet touched mine as she made cracks about the commercials and MTV. I laughed in the right places, all the while wondering how to get her to kiss me again.  
  
And then she'd said, Donna, let's go to bed. I'd stayed the night, curled into her body with the bed comforter tucked closely around us. She was fully clothed and so was I, but it was the most intimate experience that I'd ever had, her chin resting against my hair as I threaded her fingers through mine. There were no words passed back and forth as our buzz wore away.  
  
She fell asleep but I never closed my eyes. I was more comfortable and comforted than I'd been in a long while, but at the time, there seemed to be no sense in CJ's arms. There had been no prelude to this, no flirting or insinuation, simply the kiss and then her bed. But I didn't feel reckless, I didn't feel like I was falling into a bad situation. I just felt warm, safe, and most of all, I felt alive.  
  
I suppose that's what CJ did for me. In the days and weeks that would follow, Josh constantly teased me, itching to know who was making his assistant so happy. Who'd you meet? What's his name? Do I know him? Josh's self-indulgent interest was endless, and I found it hard not to spill my guts. Yet when I was an inch away from revealing the truth, I reminded myself that he wouldn't understand; the only one who could comprehend it was CJ herself.  
  
And that's what I did - I went to CJ and let her make everything better. I hoped that I was making life better for her, too, but when she was quiet, I'd never push. I only wanted that warmth, that fuzzy feeling my mind equated with love. She wanted it too and I gave it freely, never one to be stingy with something that I too craved in equal amounts.  
  
I know that we make very little sense, and I know that what we are and what we do must stay hidden behind closed doors. Our jobs require it, but our hearts do not, and if the walls could talk, I know what they'd say. That hers is a human touch. And that's all we need, really, just another human's touch. * 


End file.
